so runs the world away
by tartan robes
Summary: The day Lord Grantham dies, there is a garden party. [Class Swap AU]
1. prologue

The day Lord Grantham dies, there is a garden party.

_We could call it off,_ the middle child, the fair-haired daughter suggests, _We don't have to – _but Lady Grantham shakes her head, has Levinson draw out something black from the closet.

_Your father won't rest knowing we cancelled, _she says, curt, while Levinson folds emerald fabric between her pale hands. The Countess had been wearing yesterday's dress when the children found her, found him, found them – and then found her again, only her, because he no longer was. When they all stood in his bedroom in their breakfast clothes and their mother was sat there, primly, in her evening jewels, with her hair undone, with a hand clutching her Lord Husband's (so white the children – they were no longer children, but in that moment they were children again – thought they could see her bones, so tense so as not to lose her hold), the other hand raised just above their father's head, as though she longed to touch it. His eyes were closed.

So they find their mother now, in the garden. She wears black, a thorn in the pastel-coloured ladies skirts, and she walks through the roses. She smiles tightly; she lets ladies touch her hands; she drifts through the flowers as though there is a weightlessness to her body.

_You wouldn't even know, _Thomas says.

_Even I put on a better show_, his aunt says, pressing a cigarette between her lips because it's unbecoming. It was always unbecoming and now she has unbecome. She has lost a brother; she is no longer a sister. They smoke behind a veil of petals. Her brother would've thrown a fit.

Anna says, _Don't be cruel_, but she does not approach their mother. None of them do. They expected their mother to be a predator in grief – or a stricken beast, howling in pain. Instead, she appears unchanged. She has a single glass of champagne and even laughs when Tom Branson says something near her ear.

Her children watch her from the fringes. Between them, the wind blows against green leaves and roses bloom like a stream of blood, red roots marking some river between them.

_There had been so much light in his face_, Anna wants to say, but doesn't. There had been so much light and he had seen none of it.

/

She seemed to avoid him that last week.

Anna had arrived a week before and William two days after that and they had greeted each other as though lopsided, because Thomas had been missing. He was always missing from the Abbey when he could help it. Anna had called him after William arrived from London, determining that their eldest brother and heir was still hiding in the narrow streets and busy crowds, burrowed in some darkly lit room they'd never speak of, his lips against something not to be mentioned.

_No, it's serious this time_, Anna had said into the telephone's metal mouth. _Yes, you should be here. Yes, tomorrow morning. William and I are here already._

Anna and William and even Thomas (arms bent against the window frame, head turned away) had sat with their father and the nurse and the long shadow he cast from his headboards. Often, his speech had been cloudy. He had called them names they didn't know. They were used to that. It had been like that last time, too.

Their mother had not come. She had marshalled flowers out across the yard, spelling out strange forms on the lawn. (On the afternoon of the fifth day, when it was just Thomas, their Lord Father had found it in him to rise – for the first and last time – and father and son had stood by the window and watched Lady Grantham and the spreading of her last, grand bouquet. Thomas thought, from all the way up there, the roses looked like seams. Stitches. He had lit another cigarette and pressed it between his father's fingers. The old Lord had been too infirm to complain, too distracted to notice. What did his father see? Thomas was certain he saw something.)

Their mother had not come. She had reviewed menus and investments. She had not come unless he asked for her, which their father did often, like it was the only name he could remember, like the name was buried so deeply into his tongue, he could not help but say it.

Their mother had come when they had managed to find her on the stairs, when William had trapezed across the lawn and touched her shoulder and said, _He wants you_.

_He wants this, _Lady Grantham had replied, but she had come anyway.

_He knows her, _Anna said whenever their mother appeared, whenever she shut the door between her husband and her children, but Anna hadn't said anything more, none of them had. They had all been frightened, quietly, by the prospect of their own anonymity.

An hour would pass, maybe less, and the children would open the door and find the bedside chair cold and their mother adjusting the blankets around their father's waist, adjusting the curtains that framed the room's light, adjusting the arrangement of the pillow behind him or the glasses beside him, of every space around him that she could find.

_Did he say anything?_ Anna asked.

_Of course, darling_, their mother's voice was absent, _but now you must let me get on._

/

Here is Lady Grantham in the last week she is truly Lady Grantham.

Here is Elspeth Carson, in the narrowest hours of the night, at her husband's bedside. The moon settles around her face. She is Elspeth Carson because that is what he calls her. Occasionally, he has called her Elsie. Momentarily, all those years ago, he longed to call her Elizabeth instead. Sometimes, now, in this light, in his sickness and confusion, he says her maiden name and pronounces it with the same inflections one might profess love. She tries not to mind his words because she fears this is just another mood. She fears this entire ordeal, the sweat and the clamminess of his skin, the heavy tide of his breath, is one long, dark mood.

He speaks to her. He speaks to her like he knows her and this is more than anyone else can claim. This alone is enough to break her heart, but she'd never tell him that. Night crawls in through the windows and she tells him how lovely the roses are this year, how nice the party will be. This puts him at ease. It calms the fits.

His illness has caused him reimagine his past. He remembers the stage. He remembers her. He tells her secrets she can't believe. He says, _Do you remember when I married you?_ And she tells him, _Yes. Yes, of course I do._ And he will lie, _I picked you. I picked you because you were the most beautiful girl I had ever seen_. Perhaps he only says these things because, even with the clouds and thunder in his head, he knows it will make her laugh. She takes a liberty. She kisses his hand when he says these words and then squeezes it.

_Steady now_, she laughs and then cries and he forgets her again, can't see her with her tears. She dries her cheeks on the sequins of her sleeve, while he asks, oblivious, _Why are you crying? Why are you crying, Elspeth? _And she could cry more, because she has loved him best when he has called her by that name. She could cry more because he sees her less clearly when the sun rises. Instead she says, _It's nothing. It's nothing. I'm a fool, Charles. A sentimental fool. _And then she laughs again, _It was me all along._

_Don't tell the children_, she thinks of adding, but she isn't sure he remembers that they have children.

She takes his hand. She sits by his knees and takes his hands and tells him she will be here when he wakes up, because he will wake up, because it's almost the day, and because there are roses in the lawn and he will have to see them, have to see how beautiful they are.

She watches every breath when he sleeps. She holds tightly to his pulse, as though it might evaporate under her touch.

/

The morning he dies, she is Elsie Hughes again.

She was wearing green that evening and so, when she comes to him, the emeralds around her neck shine in a glimmering chorus. She has never liked these jewels, likes them less now that she thinks herself too old for them, but she thought he would like to see her wear them. When they first were, properly were, believed that they were, this is the colour he had liked her best in. When he calls her Elsie – and oh, how cobwebbed his voice is, how hoarse – she wonders if he's begun to see the beginning instead of the end. Does he see her as he first saw her? What's the difference, really? The lights in the sky are out and so she takes down her hair. Does he see all the silver in it, now?

She wants to tell him, _They're roses. This year, they're all roses. Your favourite_. Instead, she finds her own throat too hoarse to speak.

On this night, this morning, these last few hours, he does not tell her she's beautiful, he doesn't sputter out his concerns for their children, for the days to come. He smiles at her. She wishes, deeply, she still had it in him to chide him, to mock him. How does he recognize her when she doesn't?

But then, there's nothing to laugh at. She knows it. She thinks he knows it too, and she cannot bring herself to laugh.

Her hand covering his. Her hand, like an anchor. Her hand where her hand has been for twenty sleepless nights now, closed and cool and begging him, _stay, stay, stay_. Her dress is heavy and sparkles even without the light. She will ruin it if she moves as she will, but she has always followed her will and now she grips his hand tighter as she crawls beneath the covers with him. She lies next to him and holds his hand and looks at his eyes and she has not been like this, they have not been like this for years now. Something inside her aches. The muscles of her hand are strained with prayer, pleading with him, _Steady, steady, steady_.

_My dearest friend_, she says, and they watch the sky crack and bloom all sorts of warm, bloody colours.

_My dearest friend_, he says, and her two hands are clasped around his and they are both smiling.

The sky is blue and the trees are golden in the sunlight. She wants to rush to the windows, to crack them up and draw the translucent veils back farther. Perhaps he will be able to see the roses, perhaps he'll be able to see – He would hate for her to do even that, to pull a simple swath of fabric aside and, in this moment, holding his pulse in two hands, she thinks she would hate it too. No, not hate it, but fear it. Fear letting go of this hand, even for a moment.

So she stays, and the light that comes in and over their bedsheets, her necklace, his pale throat, his hooded eyes, their veined palms and silvered hair, the light is gauzey and thin. Something pushes the curtains apart and Elsie Hughes sees a blue sky, and Elspeth Carson sees her husband's eyes close.

So she stays, she stays right where she is, she stays and she does not move except for her hands, which squeeze, which squeeze, which squeeze.

So she stays, and he doesn't.

/ / /

**A/N:** Hello again. Long time, no see. I've been hiding away in Google Docs and AO3, but I hope you've been well. I wrote this in early October and I was only going to post it if I managed to write the next few parts, but I haven't. So maybe this will motivate me to. I hope so. I've been meaning to try my hand at a class swap set for a long time now and I have quite a number of things I'd like to cover, quite a number of characters, but we'll see what happens. I thought though, I'd start at the 'end'. Or, an end, anyway, before going backwards. So here's a small thing. I hope you enjoy.


	2. all the world's

**ACT ONE: ALL THE WORLD'S**  
><em>In which the Lord and Lady of Grantham are neither of these titles<em>

* * *

><p><strong>I. ANGELS<strong>

The sun of the stage lights, the dust that's been polished clean from the cracks in the floorboards, the scuff marks on the polished floor, the traces of where his feet have been before, been for months now, the boys – the men, the men playing at boys – waiting in the wings, the wicked grin on Charlie's face, the solemn line of his own mouth – the way the other performers have taken to teasing him, relentlessly, _where'd your cheer go, Charlie?_ – the breath gathering in his throat, his heels lifted from the floor, and then –

– the way the music swells, first below his feet, then up, through his lungs, and out his mouth, their mouths, singing, feet racing, chasing the steps they've made a thousand times before.

Charles Carson looks out. Under the glare of lights, the whole theatre is dark, unknowable, but his eyes keep searching out, out, because there, just below the lamp's halo, they're out there. His audience. And so, despite himself, because of himself, he smiles.

And from the balcony, they watch the two men, the one-two, one-two of their feet, emerging from the wings.

"Oh," Anice says, her arms thrown over the balcony's edge, her whole body craned, "I do love this one."

Two seats over, her sister has a book in her lap. "Enter," Elspeth Hughes says, "two fools."

She doesn't even look up.

/

Here is what he knows about the Hughes sisters:

That they are wealthy – or, that their father is. A new kind of wealthy, the kind, he tells Grigg, doesn't count. Not in the any of the ways that matter. ("Except when it comes to using it," Grigg will reply, half joking, half miserable. Grigg gave up all traces of his respectability when his pockets first wore thin.) Malcolm Hughes has the kind of money that's so fresh, it steams when you touch it. He is something of a rarity. A self-made Scotsman with a proper fortune to rival the greatest of lords. His purse is the pulse of Glasgow, the singing ladies laugh behind their fans. He makes the factories smoke and railroads bend. They are all rarities, he thinks and the thought is a not entirely kind, the way neither father nor his daughters fit into high society.

That Malcolm Hughes' kind donation to the theatre is why his daughters frequently find perch near the bannister. That Anice, being young and giddy, is especially taken with the shining lights and glimmering voices. That without their mother, who is now eternally young and cold-fleshed and buried with more prestige than a woman of her class deserves (but, rather, what the pockets of her husband can afford), and with the many portfolios that clutter their father's mind, the girls are almost feral in their freedom. There is an older chaperone, of course, but she falls asleep as soon as the lights turn on. He thinks the sisters are as good as thieves, the way they've poached enough liberties to rival wild creatures, and yet all they do is sit there. All they do is watch.

That all of them in the rafters, even the singing girls, call them angels. Or, that they call Anice an angel anyway. Her older sister is not so obliging, quicker to snap her papers together or – it has been said – give a sly actor a proper tongue-lashing for even the most innocent of suggestions. But Anice, Anice will giggle and shine and bend her hands down when you flatter her. She'll catch a boy's winks with both hands and squeeze it tightly into her veins. "She wants to fall," Grigg once said, lewdly. It relieves him to see Elspeth behind her, gently holding her hand.

But that even Elspeth is capable of folly. He has seen her in conversation with one of the opera women, enchanted by the stitching in her garment. She does not mind him either, he thinks, because he is proper and good in the presence of ladies and he tells Charlie off when he jokes about either of them. (He, at least, has not forgotten who he is. Not entirely.) He thinks, despite the books she keeps in her lap (her own act, perhaps), Elspeth Hughes is fond of the theatre as well.

/

He is sitting first row, while _The Lark and the Dove _are flitting about on stage, rehearsing. He watches Alice bend to adjust her shoe and catches a glimpse of her ankle, illuminated. He thinks to flush, but on his left, Grigg whistles and ribs him gently and Charles finds himself laughing, half-heartedly, because it has been his habit to do so. He's not sure when he stopped finding Grigg funny.

It barely matters, because Grigg isn't looking at his face and he isn't looking at Grigg. Their eyes are on the Neal sisters – or, the Neal sister, because Alice smiles and the world smiles back at her, and he smiles back, wide and stupid. "That," Grigg is fond of telling him, "is why you always lose at cards." He has bought her flowers, went bright and early this morning and paid a good price for his bloom, with all the colours of her stage dress bursting from the stalks. It isn't much, he knows. In Paris, he's heard the men give diamonds, but he is not in Paris, he's not even in England anymore, and as much as she deserves diamonds, he doesn't think Sarah will be parted with their mother's jewels.

(It's beginning to sour both of them, he thinks. What they no longer have.)

But he will give them to her after she has danced tonight. He will give them to her and tell her she is lovely, that she's the loveliest girl he's ever seen. (That she out-twirls every debutante, every waltzing ballroom lady he ever endured.) That he could make her happy, will make her happy. He has hidden so many hopes in each spiral of petals and he will give them all to her.

When Grigg saw the flowers this morning, he had only shook his head. "Bet those cost a pretty penny," he said, and Charles ignored him. They did, but they will be worth it.

Alice spins on stage. When she spreads her arms, he thinks she might grow wings.

Even Grigg stops whistling once the dove takes flight.

/

When he is leaving for the door, he sees the familiar plain cut of Elspeth Hughes' dress – and then a well-tailored suit, standing close on the steps, and so he averts his eyes, walks straight –

"Oh – Mr. Carson!" She calls out to him, rushing down the stairs. She steadies her hand on the bannister, stopping so their faces are almost level. The suited man steps gently behind her.

He has not said much to the elder Miss Hughes and certainly his face has never been this close to hers. He finds himself staring up, thinks of angels.

"Sorry," she straightens, "where are my manners? Mr. Carson, this is Mr. Burns." Elspeth motion to the man just behind her. She sways back, leaning closer to her Mr. Burns, says, "Joe, this is Mr. Carson. One of my sister's favourite performers."

The men exchange polite nods.

"That happens to be the problem, Mr. Carson. I was wondering if you'd seen her – Ann – my sister? She came in first and she's not up on the balcony," Miss Hughes chews her lip for a moment. "I just hate to lose track of her, especially here."

"I'm sorry, Miss Hughes, I can't say I have."

"Of course not," she says. "I'm sorry to have bothered you."

"I'll check back behind the stage," Joe Burns says. He is a nimble looking man, not terribly tall, but made of soft, warm features. Before he leaves the steps, Charles sees his hand reach out, like he might like to touch her hand, her waist. He doesn't. He gives her a smile and paces between the seats.

"It's a stupid thing of her to do," Miss Hughes says. She sounds twice her age then, her features cooling sternly, her voice reprimanding. "If it was anyone else –"

"A reputation is a delicate thing," he agrees. He's holding his hat in his hands and he isn't sure what to do with his fingers.

"Exactly – I'm sorry. You're on your way somewhere." She smiles, then turns to follow her Mr. Burns. "I did mean that though, Anice does love your act. She's positively smitten."

"And – do you have a favourite act, Miss Hughes?"

"I'm fond of the plays, Mr. Carson. I like something with substance."

"And you're saying we lack that –"

"No. I just –"

"It's fine," he says. "Lately, I find myself agreeing with you."

She studies him for a moment and he has a feeling he's said something wrong, but she only gives him another hurried smile before descending.

He watches her follow Mr. Burns' path, hands clasp calmly together, head high, and he admires her for that, he thinks, but doesn't allow himself anything more. He puts on his hat. He has flowers to retrieve.

/

**II. BIRDS**

His hands shake when he hands Alice the bouquet.

She says, "Oh." Her face is still flushed from flying. The curtains have drifted shut, and they are in the dark, but her face glows. She smiles then and says, "Thank you." Alice Neal is nothing like the ladies he used to dance with, a lifetime ago. Her hair is falling, wild, in her eyes and she doesn't demure or tell him he shouldn't have. She takes the flowers with both hands, chest heaving, picks through each one, inspecting the petals.

I love you, he wants to say. He wants to tell her how beautiful her face glows, how wonderful it is to watch her dance. How she was the first thing he saw, practicing, the arc of her spine as she reached for her toes, when he and Grigg first fumbled out of Glasgow's smoke and into the theatre. How her face, the motion of her feet, her smile, is what has kept him steady this year, through the nights when he wakes and sees Grigg rifling through drawers (looking for his money, he knows, though it's always a lost sock, a misplaced watch), or when Grigg comes back to their chambers drenched in alcohol, or when he has had too much to drink and his mind goes aimless and dark, wondering how he'll ever get out, if he still has somewhere else to go.

Let me marry you, he thinks. He wouldn't ask her to stop dancing, but they could get a home and he could… Well, he could find some sort of employment. God knows he's qualified. "What? Would you bring her back to the Abbey?" Grigg had quipped once, delighted. "That'll give your old man a real fright." He's right, of course, Alice doesn't belong there. Has no makings of a lady within her, but does it matter? It wouldn't matter, if she would only, if he could only –

"Oh, stop that, Charlie!" Alice is saying. She can nearly look him in the eyes. "This was nice. Don't ruin it with that frown of yours." And then she laughs and he wonders if he's ruined it all. She slips through his fingers, twirling , graceful as a swan.

But she touches his wrist before she goes, wreathed in his flowers, each petal aglow, and he thinks he will sleep well tonight.

/

Enter JOE BURNS, kindly faced, and ELSIE HUGHES, on his arm. They enter through the red velvet curtains and pause at the side of the STAGE, old, worn. The lights are off. They think they are alone.

JOE: Come on. Just one. For me.

ELSIE: It's hardly proper.

He has her hands in his and is holding her close, whispering with his forehead bent near hers.

JOE: We're in the theatre, Elsie. What is it you're always saying? The rules don't apply here?

ELSIE: [warning] Joe –

JOE: [joking] Do you not like me anymore, Elsie?

ELSIE: Right now, I'm not entirely sure –

Elsie Hughes smiles, pulls a hand free, twirls away from him. Her skirt billows. She pauses, looking out in the empty audience, still holding Joe's hand in her right – and then twirls back towards him, quick as she went, to kiss him – chastely, quickly – before pulling him both away.

Exit Joe Burns and Elsie Hughes, arm in arm, as they came.

Exit CHARLES CARSON, who had been shadowed at the bottom, watching their play.

/

(Did he not notice she was beautiful until he twirled? The way she laughed at her Mr. Burns and pulled away, the way she fell into him again, their faces shadowed, he could not see – had not been meaning to see, to look, to spy, but he had been there and she had been above him – the sound of her skirt, like the wind, like wings – Well, don't think about it, Charles, he tells himself. He is no longer one of her kind. He never was. Or, she never was. He lies awake and night and thinks of him, but how could he go back now? What would he say?)

/

The performers are gathered at a dance hall and Grigg is dizzy with spirits and he has had a few glasses himself, to make himself the _Cheerful Charlie _they wish him to be and the band is loud and he is dancing and Alice is dancing on his arm and they are spinning round in circles and he tells her he looks nice, even though her face isn't staying still, the whole world moving and spinning the way it will.

"Thank you, Charlie," she laughs and then it's Charlotte Neal in his arms, not Alice, and then it's one of the opera singers, and then the music is slow and he's watching Alice is bend to listen to Grigg say something in her ear, and she's laugh, she's always laughing.

"Just helping you along," Grigg tells him later, when they're stumbling down the streets. "That's your old pal Charlie. A proper Cupid."

/

It is a week later, when he's leaving the shops (he wanted a new coat, hasn't had one in years now, and this one is getting worn (his mother would faint, he thinks, if she could see it), but he had emptied his pockets and still come up short, and so he is leaving the door with his head bowed, face flushed with shame.

He is thinking about writing a letter home, about asking his father for money or perhaps a ticket home, but – he imagines Sarah's face, Smith or Robert – no, it will be Crawley now, won't it? – letting him in through the doorway and her standing on the steps, looking gleeful at his horrible clothes. They must think him dead by now. Or as good as dead, all the things he missed. Would they even recognize him? He is trying to work out how to fit an apology that large into such small letters, when he spies Miss Hughes stepping lightly down the street.

He startles her when he falls to her side.

"Mr. Carson! I'm sorry, I didn't see you. My mind was somewhere else."

He smiles. "It's quite all right, Miss Hughes. I'm surprised to see you here, alone –"

"Don't be imperious. Mr. Burns – do you remember -? Yes, Mr. Burns was just being quite the rogue and leaving me to finish up with the books."

"The books?"

"My father's. I help keep them. Mr. Burns, too," she waves her hands. "Company things. Things for my father. It's nothing, really."

"You surprise me, Miss Hughes."

"Do I? By being capable of some maths? Your standards aren't that high, Mr. Carson. – Oh, I was only teasing. But honestly, Mr. Carson, did you think I just lounged on your balcony –"

"– It's not _my _balcony –"

"– all day?"

"Well! No, but!" But she's caught him out, he supposes and he falls silent, watching the twist of her grin.

It is a Glasglow evening and so it is cold and the sky is grey and the ground is grey and they are moving from one busy street to the next. People pass and do not look at either of them, when certainly, perhaps, if they knew who they were, perhaps they would. Better that they don't, he thinks, playing with the loose threads of his sleeve.

"I'll walk you home," he says, after a few more grey streets, over the noise of rickety wheels and polished shoes.

"What a gentleman," Miss Hughes replies, but seems grateful all the same.

It soothes some of his shame, to feel appreciated again, respectable again.

/

**INTERMISSION  
><strong>  
>"Isn't it curious," Anice whispers, "how proper the two Charlies speak? I find it very mysterious. Like a detective novel."<p>

"I find it none of our business," her sister says.

"You are absolutely no fun. Even Father asked after Mr. Carson, the other evening, when he brought you home."

"Did he?" Her sister is still indifferent.

"Yes. _He _finds it most peculiar too."

"Mm. Fascinating."

/

**III. FOOLS **

A few things happen in quick succession. He comes home and his room has been turned over, and the room next to it – Grigg's has been emptied. And the panel at the back of his drawer has been lifted, what few pounds he had left are missing.

He finds himself cursing.

And then embarrassed, because he always knew this was how it was going to end, with Grigg stealing off with every last cent.

Then he thinks, perhaps something's happened, because Grigg is still _Charlie_, because there are two of them, have been since they were boys in school uniforms, so the least he can do for that wretched _friend _of his is check, but he arrives at an empty stage.

Save Charlotte Neal, nosing through the folds of the curtains, as if she might find what she's looking for in the ruffles.

When she sees him, her eyes narrow, and the lark's faces hardens. "He's gone too, then?"

"Yes – how did you –" But then his heart has dropped to his feet, because he knows too.

"I knew it. I didn't think she'd _run_ _off_, but I should've – should've known," Charlotte says, though he's stopped listening. Was the theatre always this large? This dark? This empty?

"You wouldn't believe the stories he told her, Charlie. Madness, every last one, and she fell for them all the same. My stupid sister. You wouldn't believe it. Told her he was _lord_. I said, 'Our Charlie Grigg? Lord of the bar, maybe.' But she told me he had a proper estate. Back in England, she said. With servants! Can you believe that?"

But his hands are already stuffed into his pockets. Empty. He has nothing, absolutely nothing. He tries to breathe evenly, calmly. He tries to step lightly.

Absolutely nothing.

The bastard.

/

Later, lying in his overturned bed, thinking of the way Alice laughed at him, smiled for him, danced with him (and laughed with Grigg, smiled with Grigg, danced with Grigg), there is a knock (and his heart almost leaps, thinking it will be her, running to him, flowers in hand, having made a horrible mistake; or even Grigg, simpering and small and so easy to thrash about, just once, maybe twice) and, when he opens the door, he meets a stranger. The man is nearly as tall as he is, with pursed lips and a spine ironed straight and a suit, he noticed, the knot in his heart growing, nicer than any of the ones he has left. The man rocks on the balls of his feet, uncomfortable to be, Charles suspects, in this end of the city, in this horrible, dark hallway with a myriad of horrible, dark rooms. He coughs lightly, says, "Mr. Malcolm Hughes, Sir, has received this telegram and he thinks it will be of your interest."

_SURPRISED TO FIND YOU BREATHING. FATHER IS DEATHLY ILL. IF YOU STILL FANCY YOURSELF A PART OF THIS FAMILY, I SUPPOSE YOU MIGHT COME SEE HIM. IF YOU CAN MANAGE THE GESTURE._

_AFFECTIONATELY,_  
><em>YOUR SISTER<em>

He has nothing (and now, perhaps, everything).

/

**IV. FRIENDS**

There are questions, he supposes, he ought to be asking. Or plans he ought to make. He doesn't feel like that yet, can't fathom how to move forward. He is stewing in the theatre when she finds him. His is swinging his feet off the edge of the stage, thinking of a noose, thinking of falling, thinking of how cold it is, without the lights. He barely notices her at his side, her hands smoothing her skirt as she sits on his right. It's like she's floated down from the balcony.

"A broken heart," he hears her say, looks up and finds Miss Hughes' face sympathetic, her words firm, "is just like any other illness, Mr. Carson, and can be medicated just the same."

She looks kind, but he isn't feeling much like kindness. His tongue tastes bitter, his voice is hoarse. He says, "And what does the doctor prescribe, Miss Hughes?"

"Rest, mainly. A good sleep and," she produces a bottle from the other side of her skirt, two glasses, "plenty of fluids."

"This is very proper –"

"This is the theatre, Mr. Carson. If I wanted proper, I'd visit Buckingham."

"You shouldn't make light of –"

"Do you want a glass or not?"

He does. He sips. She sips.

He says, half the glass gone, "How did you know?"

"Oh, Anice is a fiend for gossip."

"It was – it's kind of you to –"

"Don't think anything of it."

He drinks a bit more, feels a bit of warmth in chest.

"I'm sorry, too," she says, "about your father. Don't – I didn't mean to snoop, but my Father told me. He looked into you, I suppose. Your family."

"So you know."

"I understand you're not just who you appear to be, yes."

"I suppose you think me very foolish."

"I wouldn't –"

"We were friends, Grigg and I. Good friends. At school. We used to make people laugh, were good at singing those stupid songs boys do. He was a second son, you understand, so never had much of anything – and I – I suppose I was afraid of my title, then. What my title would be. I was a stupid boy and my best friend was too, so when he said we might as well forget it all, run off and perform –"

"You came out here."

"After a time. We always went as far as we could, where no one might know us."

"You haven't been home for some time, then?"

"No, I –," he thinks of his mother. In his head, she is still slim and pretty, with only a few lines around her mouth, smelling of her Parisian perfume. "It's been many years, Miss Hughes."

They do not say much more, finish their glasses. She touches his hand, just for a moment says, "All things pass, Mr. Carson. This will too." And then, "Walk me home?"

/

(He wonders, only a few days later, if she knew what her father had planned, would she still have come to him that afternoon? Would she had insisted they were friends now, whatever he was? He hopes she would've, suspects she might not have. Not the way either of them were then.)

/

**V. FATHERS**

Malcom Hughes' office is built from paper. Shipping maps and books falling across every side. It is cold and stuffy and smells of dust. He stands awkwardly in the doorway, having been led there by one of his three maids. (It is a humble house, for all its wealth. He finds that puzzling, almost improper.) Anice had rushed to the door, voice high and eager, while he had been helping Elspeth up the steps, that _Oh good, Mr. Carson! What a happy occasion. Father would very much like to see you_.

Here is what the businessman says: he says he's looked into him, Charles Carson, soon to be Earl of Grantham, hmm? Judging by the state of his father – very sorry about the father, by the by. Life is cruel. Fortunate, anyway, that he, Malcolm Hughes that is, had taken it upon himself to look into this man his daughters spoke so highly of. Surely he couldn't be an average performer and, ah, no he was not, now was he? He had heard, too, of his recent misfortunes. He could see, too, the state of his jacket, his shoes. Surely these were not the standards he was accustom to. Surely, in light of everything, he was planning to make his way home, wasn't he?

Yes. Malcolm had thought so. Ah, but was he right in thinking Mr. Carson no longer had two coins to rub together? Yes. He had thought so too, he had. And right too, to assume his parents, his family, his entire society perhaps, had been left perplexed when he and his, ah, former companion had stolen away? Vanished for, how many years had it been now? I suppose, Mr. Hughes had said, you didn't want anyone to know of this, ah, divergence. It wouldn't be becoming of a future Earl, now would it? (And Charles' face had flushed, again, with shame.)

Well, wasn't it fortunate for him that Mr. Hughes had looked into him, contacted his family. Now he may see his father, can't he? But you see, Mr. Hughes is not a man of simple kindnesses. He has a great many of them, because, surely, Charles can't return like this. He's been thinking about this hasn't he? He has no explanations. He has no money. Perhaps no desire to beg for coin from a sickly father and a sister who writes so – ah – lovingly to him.

He can fix all of that. Mr. Hughes will pay for a new suit, for his fare. They can be partners, Mr. Hughes says, now that Mr. Carson finds himself without one. They can do a great deal for each other, the Scotsman says. He can have an alibi arranged. They can pretend Charles has been in his employ all along. Sent to America, even. It will not be a perfect story, but it will be better, certainly, than the truth.

There is only one thing Malcolm Hughes asks in return, one single thing for all these great kindnesses. A simple turn that will promise additional kindnesses in turn. It is not so much to ask, is it? Certainly, the Scotsman says, leaning over his desk, it is to their mutual advantage, perhaps even sells this story of theirs more completely.

So, and finally the businessman smiles, what does our lord here say?

It is a small thing. A single, small thing.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:** Well, this took some time, didn't it? I apologize. It took awhile to hammer out and even now, I'll be the first to admit it isn't perfect, but I figure it's best to try and push on. There's a lot more I'd like to at least attempt to cover! So here we are. Thank you for the kind words so far. The part that comes after this one was more cooperative than this section was, so I promise the next update, at least, won't take nearly as long. Also, as you've probably noticed, a few bits of this meagre story will be a bit more experimental than usual. I'm just trying to have fun with it. I hope you enjoy! I think this set up for the swappped backstories is, according to my simple research, plausible. Perhaps not the most likely, but I think it's fun, so. Here we are!


	3. this, to become

**ACT TWO: THIS, TO BECOME  
><strong>_In which Miss Elspeth Hughes accepts a proposal, and Elsie Hughes rejects another. _

* * *

><p><strong>I.<strong>

They are standing at the bottom of the steps. Outside, the day is waning and Glasgow is blustering smoke and winds, and, inside, Anice Hughes turns her fan over in her hands, fluttering without need. He never realized how young she is, he thinks, not until now, swimming in her skirts, her free hand tracing the lace pattern around her neck.

Charles Carson can feel the eyes of the paintings on him and, more unnerving, the eyes of the few Hughes maids. The latter never used to bother him. As a boy, they'd pass over his skin like water, but it has been some time since he was a boy, sometime since he was home (and anyway, he tells himself, these maids cannot be nearly as discreet as Downton's; they are not quite great house material, the pair he can feel roosting behind the door). When he was here the last time, he had complimented the paintings and meant it quiet sincerely, but Mr. Hughes hadn't been particularly pleased, as one would expect the master of the house to be, offering only an, "Ah. Yes. My daughter sorted them all out," and he had been reminded of how new the Hughes family money was, in every way it could be. ("You musn't take offence," Elspeth tells him later. "My father doesn't know a room outside his office. The paintings could be mirrors and he wouldn't bat an eye.") Now he feels all the eyes burning along his skin like stage-lights and he wishes they wouldn't, wishes this to be more natural – for it is natural, he keeps telling himself, this is who he was meant to be.

Anice's eyes are glowing brightest of all. He feels as though he'd be able to spot her gaze in the night, that delicate moth wings would float to her hair and burn up, magnetized by the way she's studying him now. The girl turns her head profile, beats the fan on the other side, as if to insulate the conversation. Her neck has adopted a pose of indifference, studying a landscape above their heads, to the left of the staircase. It is a performance to indicate that she is telling him a secret, to indicate he should listen.

"She wasn't happy, you know," In public, Anice Hughes rarely speaks in questions, but facts, as if you do know, you already know (or certainly, that you should know). It's almost charitable, the way she assumes the most of her audience. "I've never heard her yell like that – though, of course, I wasn't in the room. I was just outside the door – not eavesdropping, well, not eavesdropping exactly – but even if I had been, I wouldn't have needed to. I've never heard my sister so cross. She called it blackmail and then that it was cruel of our father to use you like this – which I agree with, of course – and how this wasn't simply another business negotiation to make. And, she said, had anyone asked her whether she – in her words – 'deigned to be a great lady?'" (That part, Anice tells him, stilling her fan, she couldn't quite understand. Who wouldn't, she said, want to be the Lady of Grantham? It was a verifiable honour.)

Elspeth's sister does not relay this story in the way his sister would have. Which is to say, there was no malice in it. He remembered Sarah as being fond of spite and sharpened fury, but here, at the foot of the staircase, looking up for the silhouette of her sister, Anice Hughes speaks with clumsy cunning, with innocent envy. Why not her? He can hear the questions between her breaths. Why has her sister been found so superior? So fit to be a lady? Hasn't she been kind to him too? Isn't she the sister that had been fond of his act? Hadn't it been Elspeth – not Ann – who had called the Charlies empty and foolish?

And isn't she, her silence further intones, the sister more fond of dancing? Of parties? Of finery and jewels and all the things her mind thought a lady was made of? Is she not the more suitable sister?

She's so young, he thinks again. Though Elspeth is not much older, he knows, not technically and yet – he cannot see a trace of Elspeth in Anice's face now, as her hand stills, as she turns to look him in the eyes and then back up the steps where –

Where _She_ is, in blue, in all the virtues he is just beginning to see. She stands at the top of the steps and her face is calm and her dress is simple and her steps are light and she looks nothing like the Lady of Grantham, but she is his friend, he thinks, and it makes him smile despite the quiet on her face.

"I'm sorry to have kept you waiting," she says, but she doesn't sound all that sorry.

And then, on the last step, "Ann, perhaps you can go tell father I'm finally ready."

Her sister hides a pout behind her fan and twirls off through a doorway. Elspeth watches her go before turning a hard glare towards another door and they listen to the maids wash away until it's just them.

He waits.

/

**II.**

"You're not going to get down on one knee, are you?"

"Well – I – I mean – it is the correct thing to do, Miss Hughes."

"You can if you like," her smile is tight, but the words are gentle, soft. "Only, you don't have to, that's all. We don't have to pretend or put on a show, not here, anyway, not between ourselves."

"It would not be a show. It would be the right thing to do."

A pause.

"You can be quite peculiar, Mr. Carson. Do you know that?"

He has dropped to his knee and her face is even again. She gives him her hand.

He asks her, _Will you? _and she replies with a curt nod.

"Yes, Mr. Carson, I will marry you."

And then, withdrawing her hand, "Now, shall we join my father?"

/

**III.**

"It's quite unfair," is what Anice tells her, lying on the edge of her bed as they plait their hair. Elsie watches her from her mirror. "Why do you get all the romances?"

Elsie laughs, "They're not quite romances. They're not fit for any novels, if that's what you mean. You'll have your turn soon enough."

"I better. You don't even _like _Mr. Carson."

"I don't dislike him. You can't expect me to love the man, can you? We barely know each other."

"What about Joe? You know him –"

Elsie stands. She takes her sister's hands and draws her up, fixing the ends of her braid. "Soon," Anice says, "you'll have someone to do that for you."

"Susan could, if you asked her to."

"But I prefer it when you do it."

"Well," Elsie makes a tidy bow at the end, "you'll have to learn how to make it neater for when I'm not around."

"It's unfair," Anice repeats.

"Most things are." She adjusts the collar of Ann's nightgown. "But, when I get to Yorkshire, I will find you a duke for your suffering."

"You owe me a prince," Ann grins now, her pout forgotten, "for all the suffering you'll put me through."

"A prince, then." She thinks of kissing her sister's head, but instead touches her hand, just for a moment. "Now, go to bed."

"As you wish, Your Ladyship," Anice mocks a curtsey on her way out and Elsie rolls her eyes, but smiles all the same.

/

**IV.  
><strong>  
>Elsie Hughes is lying in her bed, where she lies on her back, where she lies perfectly still, where she finds herself unwilling to blow out her lights, not yet. Not quite yet. She feels safe, though, which is not to say she has felt <em>unsafe<em> during the rest of her day just – she feels exhausted, feels as though she can finally show it. She feels too exhausted to sleep.

The room always looks different by lamplight. She sits up a bit and finds her reflection a stranger. A few yellow lines, the shadow of her hair. She can only make out fragments of her room: the frame of her mirror, the fringes of her curtains; the light makes the florals dappled across her bed sheets glow. This will not be her room much longer, she thinks and then scolds herself. What could she expect? A job? That had always been out of the question. Her father would not see his daughters sink lower than what he had built for them.

She is thinking of Joe on his knee. Thinking of how she laughed as he did it, how he faked anger – _No, I'm serious, Elsie, I am_. She had told him she'd think about it, she would, but had let him kiss her quickly anyway. And he had said she could take all the time in the world, but that he hoped she wouldn't. She is thinking of Mr. Carson on his knee and how she let him hold her hand and nothing more. She is thinking of how she said _yes_.

If she is honest, she does not mind Mr. Carson, truly. It is an advancement of her position, of her family's. He can give her that and Joe can't and she is not without ambition. She doesn't love him, but she does not loathe him either. They can get along, she feels. And, what she will not tell Anice, is that she doesn't love Joe either, not truly. If she did, perhaps this would be harder. Certainly, it would harder. She is fond of Joe. She thinks him good and kind and they might be happy too, but what would she do, married to a banker? Mr. Carson offers her a greater purpose.

And it will hurt, she thinks as she bends over her light, snuffs it out, to let go of him, but he'll understand. He is understanding to a fault, her Joe. Her Joe. Elsie tosses the phrase over silently and then lets it go.

She will do what she must.

/

**V.  
><strong>  
>Joe Burns takes her arm in his and holds her close even though he must know what she's going to say. It's raining and the streets are grey, but they usually are, and he's holding the umbrella over their heads. He's holding her hand close to him, but not as close as he'd like and this is how she knows. She can feel the breaths between them and she knows that he knows. He doesn't stop looking at her, though. She keeps her eyes fixed on the streets, but he keeps his eyes fixed on her face and she wishes he wouldn't, but won't tell him to stop.<p>

She will not lie to him. She will not tell him Mr. Carson is a better man, because she is not yet sure he is. She will not tell him she loves him, either of them. She will not tell him she doesn't love him.

She says, "But you understand, don't you?"

"My father is keen on this and I can't tell him no. It means too much to him, to the family. And he would make Ann unhappy." They step over a puddle. She doesn't look down. "I've worked so hard to make sure she has never been that and she would have a lifetime of it as the Countess of Grantham. She's too young. She doesn't understand what it'll be like."

"You make it all sound very noble," Joe says, but without bitterness.

"Stop. I don't mean –"

"You will be a wonderful Lady." They have stopped at a corner and she brings herself to look at him. "He is a very lucky man, Mr. Carson. Don't let him forget it."

"I'm not going anywhere. Not just yet."

"No. You're not."

"But, when I do, you'll look out for her, won't you? She'll have to stop going to the theatre. I doubt she'll find any more lords there, anyway –"

"Of course I will. Of course, Elsie."

She thinks she may grow to miss the way he says her name, but doesn't dwell on it. They are crossing the street now and, as they do, she slips her arm free of his. Smoke and rain, all of Glasgow's touches are the same.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:** Exams are swallowing me whole, but thank you so much to those who left reviews. I'm more appreciative of them than I can say. I'm still trying to work out how I'd like to tell this, so I hope the pacing is horrible. Have a lovely rest of your week.


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